8 THE QUEENS COURIER • MARCH 8, 2018 FOR BREAKING NEWS VISIT WWW.QNS.COM
LIC residents slam city’s decision
to house homeless men at hotel
BY ANGELA MATUA
amatua@qns.com / @angelamatua
Long Island City residents on March 1
sharply criticized the city’s decision to bus
out homeless families from a nearby hotel
to house homeless men instead.
Th e City View Inn, located at 33-17
Greenpoint Ave., began admitting families
Photo via Facebook/Fairfi eld Inn
The city began housing homeless men at this Long Island City hotel in January.
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last July. In January, the Department
of Homeless Services (DHS) transferred
the families to other shelters to make
room for single men.
According to Community Board 2
Chairperson Denise Keehan-Smith, DHS
did not notify the board about the change,
which offi cially occurred on Jan. 19. She
heard about it from a news report aft er
the switch had already been made.
DHS offi cials said all 54 families were
moved to other sites to meet “immediate
capacity needs.” Th ey added that due
to the long periods of cold weather, the
amount of single men requiring shelter
rose. Single adult men are also not
allowed to occupy the same shelter as
families with children.
Families who live near the hotel attended
a Community Board 2 meeting in
Sunnyside on March 1 to express how
the change has negatively impacted the
neighborhood and local businesses in
the area.
Erika Clooney, a co-owner of Bantry
Bay Publick House at 33-01 Greenpoint
Ave., has been working at the bar and
restaurant for 12 years. Clooney and her
husband recently bought into the business,
putting their “entire life savings”
into the pub.
Clooney said she had “absolutely no
problem” with the homeless families next
door to her business but that since the
switch “the demeanor of my business
and my neighborhood has completely
changed.”
Currently, 60 rooms with 114 beds, or
85 percent of the building is occupied by
the single adult men.
She said she has had to call 911 three
times in the last three months and that
recently, two men who she believes are
staying at the homeless shelter entered
her bar, asked for two beers and ran out
without paying for them.
“What I’m afraid of right now, I’ve
never had to have a thought to have
a buzzer on my door,”
she said. “I might have
to buzz people in. Th at
looks really bad. My life
savings is in this. Th ey
have just come in with
one swift brush and now
could completely blow
out my future.”
Clooney said is also
concerned by the city’s
plan to convert the
Fairfi eld Inn by Marriott
at 52-34 Van Dam St.,
which is about three
blocks away from her
business, into a permanent
homeless shelter.
“I’m very, very upset
over the potential homeless
shelter being proposed
at the Marriott,”
she said. “I get most of
our night business from
the Marriott hotel. We
have a lot of tourists, a
lot of local businessmen,
a lot of people working
construction on those
bridges that are there
staying every night and
they come to our restaurant.”
Maria Davis, who has
lived in the Blissville
section of Long Island
City for 16 years, owns
a home near the hotel.
She also has two teenage
daughters, 17 and 19,
who have autism. She
said this conversion has aff ected them.
“My 17-year-old just fi nished travel
training because she wants to be an independent
traveler,” Davis said, her voice
shaking. “But because there are 100 men
living in that homeless shelter I had to
explain to her that she could not meet her
goal of becoming an independent traveler
in her community and that our neighborhood
is no longer as safe as it once was.”
Davis told the board that as she walked
out of her house at 8:30 a.m. one morning
she found “a man as big as a defensive
lineman in front of my house smoking
weed.”
Th e man, who she believes is a shelter
resident, shouted “profanities” and
became “agitated and belligerent” as she
walked away from her house, she said.
Th ere are currently 262 people from
Community District 2 in shelters around
the city and 758 individuals sheltered
in the district, DHS offi cials said. Th e
three hotels already providing shelter in
the district include Th e Verve Hotel in
Long Island City, which houses homeless
women, the City View Inn and the Best
Western Hotel in Sunnyside, a shelter for
homeless families.
Matt Wallace, the chief of staff for
Councilman Jimmy Van Bramer, attended
the meeting to express his boss’ frustration
at how DHS and Mayor
Bill de Blasio have handled
the homeless crisis. Wallace
said DHS is “disproportionately
siting homeless facilities
in our district.”
“It’s important that the
city provide individuals and
families who are experiencing
homelessness with shelter
and resources ensuring
opportunities for them
to fi nd work and permanent
aff ordable housing,” Wallace
said in a statement by the
councilman. “However,
Department of Homeless
Services has been reckless
in their use of commercial
hotels as temporary shelters
throughout Queens and
especially in this district. We
already house many more
homeless individuals than
those that come from our
district so we’re doing more
than our fair share already.”
In the statement, Van
Bramer said the mayor’s
Turning the Tide plan is “simply
not working” and that he
and DHS “are failing us.”
Hotels are expected to be
phased out of the shelter system
by the end of 2023 as part
of the mayor’s Turn the Tide
plan, including three hotels in
Community District 2.
David Martin, whose family
has lived in the same house in
Blissville for 100 years, said he
and his fi ancee have seen “a lot of changes”
in the neighborhood within the last
few weeks.
“Th e community that is there now is all
for helping people,” he said. “We didn’t
have any problems when there were families
there. We just want a safe neighborhood
to live in and it was until about two
months ago and now we see things happening.
I’m a scientist. I’m talking evidence.
I’m not talking feelings or emotions.”
On March 15, DHS will host a community
conversation on the Fairfi eld Inn
proposal at St. Raphael’s Church at 35-20
Greenpoint Ave. from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m.